


A Grievous Offense

by roxyryoko



Series: Drabbles in the Dark [11]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, Implied Ferdinand von Aegir/Flayn, Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), love letter, overbearing father
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-20
Updated: 2020-03-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:54:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23227408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roxyryoko/pseuds/roxyryoko
Summary: Seteth has discovered a love poem addressed to Flayn and he is certain that Manuela knows the writer. If only she would tell him.
Relationships: Manuela Casagranda & Seteth, Manuela Casagranda/Seteth
Series: Drabbles in the Dark [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1590193
Comments: 22
Kudos: 62
Collections: Those Who Drabble in the Dark





	A Grievous Offense

**Author's Note:**

> This week’s prompt is “unwanted attention!” A very fun one! Thank you Reem for beta-ing!

“This is no laughing matter, Manuela,” Seteth stated flatly as said woman’s operatic titter clattered off the walls of the infirmary room.

Clumsily, she caught herself from tumbling off her chair, not a care in the slightest to restrain her indelicate reaction. He wondered if she had swept the taverns early today. She did have the faintest rose tint to her cheeks when he originally approached. And she had seemed incapable of looking him straight in the eye.

“On the contrary,” he continued, sustaining his stiff rhetoric. “It is a matter of grave consequence.”

“Oh, but it is, Seteth!” she wheezed between those vexing guffaws. “It’s positively hilarious! The way you barged in here with that—that _look_ on your face! I thought—“

She shook her head, and attempted to recompose herself, straightening her cloak around her shoulders. “Never mind. It turns out you were just being…overly dramatic.”

He reassessed that she was, indeed, not yet drunk. She was just her normal slightly loud, slightly improper self.

He sighed—definitely not dramatically, but even so Manuela raised a smug brow. “I simply am requesting your opinion on the inquiry I posed: Do you know the identity of the student who wrote that letter?”

He pointed to the sheet of paper in her hand. It was more than a little worn with deep fold creases and clipped corners. One might even say it was well-loved. Manuela flipped it over and jostled it, revealing eloquent, flowing handwriting. 

“Seteth, relax. Please. It’s nothing to be so wound up about.”

She shook it again for emphasis and reclined back in her chair in the most unladylike posture. Glancing over it again, she took the words in with an approving hum as if she was inventing an accompanying melody.

“It’s simply darling! Someone is clearly infatuated with our little Flayn.”

Her enthusiasm was growing grating.

But Seteth was unyielding. “‘My princess is lovely, my princess is fair’?” he quoted with disdain. “‘May I hold you in an endless embrace’? It’s trite and hasn’t any semblance of polish.”

“I’d be quite flattered to receive a love poem regardless of…’polish.’” She shrugged. “I’m sure Flayn feels the same.”

A taunting glint filled her eyes and her mocking tone was boldly apparent. “Now where did you say you found this again? It just ‘fell out of her pocket,’ did it?”

He ignored the question and reclaimed the paper from her grasp, securing it in his own breast pocket. “I’ve narrowed the miscreants down to Mister Von Aegir and Mister Gloucester. And I am certain you know which of the two possesses this handwriting.”

She smirked coyly. “Yes, I do. And I could tell you. But where’s the fun in that?”

Her bright laugh shook the room and his patience.

He cast her a scrutinizing glare. “Both gentlemen approached Flayn at the ball and clearly overstepped the bounds of proper etiquette. I am convinced that is adequate evidence.”

“Oh?” Manuela frowned, pity riddling her visage. “All I remember is you scaring them away.”

She sat up in her chair and grew uncharacteristically serious. “Don’t you think you’re being overprotective? And I don’t mean just a bit. Flayn’s growing up. Let her enjoy the thrills of romance! Don’t you remember what that was like?”

Seteth crossed his arms and looked her straight in the eye as he replied with the utmost seriousness. “Certainly. Additionally, I remember the torments of the heart also associated with it. I would think you’d be well familiar with that aspect.”

Pain ripped across her brows and her mouth set into an injured pout. Quickly, Manuela turned away from him. “That was cruel, Seteth.”

Her moroseful tone did more than sting.

“Forgive me,” he attempted to amend, drawing his fingers to his throbbing temple. “I should not take my frustration out on you.” He drew a shaky breath. “She simply is not ready.”

Manuela remained quiet for a moment, and he suspected her to be blinking back tears. No doubt his inappropriate outburst had summoned unpleasant memories of her latest break up, and for that he did lament.

When she spoke it seemed directed more to the wall than to him. “We’re never ready for love, Seteth. Sometimes it just…hits us, and we have no idea why.”

With a small sniff, she blotted her mascara and then ventured a glance back at him with a most peculiar grin at her lips. “If you opened yourself up to it, you might be surprised to discover you’ve also caught someone’s eye.”

Before Seteth could begin to process this perplexing comment, the door to the infirmary swung open.

“Manuela!” called the cheerful voice of Ferdinand. “I am delighted to—“

He came to an abrupt stop at the threshold, instantly straightening up at the sight of Seteth. “Pardon me. Am I interrupting something?” 

“It seems the Goddess has sent me a sign,” Seteth surmised with triumph.

After a quick nod to his colleague, he bid a departing, “Good day, Manuela.”

In response, she offered a weak wave of the hand and a roll of the eyes, mumbling something almost comically preposterous about not being too hard on the boy. 

Seteth crossed the room with a clip in his step that urged the young man to flee a few inches back into the hall.

“Ferdinand,” he called bluntly. “Do you have a moment? I wish to have a word about your penmanship.”


End file.
